


Filial Responsibility 101 (A Less Civic Remix)

by Timjan



Category: Crooked Media RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, Crooked Exchange, Crooked Remix 2019, F/F, M/M, Remix, Role Reversal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-29
Updated: 2019-09-29
Packaged: 2020-10-24 04:54:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20700272
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Timjan/pseuds/Timjan
Summary: A Favreau and a Lovett have a meet-cute at a school board meeting. But this is not really their story.





	Filial Responsibility 101 (A Less Civic Remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [celli](https://archiveofourown.org/users/celli/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Civic Responsibility 101](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17616455) by [celli](https://archiveofourown.org/users/celli/pseuds/celli). 

> Hi celli! I hope you like this little role-reversal. : )
> 
> Keep it safe secret!

When the vet tech handed Jon Leo's carrier, Jon immediately noticed that something was off. "Hey, bud, did you lose some weight in there?" he asked, peering confusedly through the mesh. But wait, that wasn't Leo!

"Mom, this isn't..." was all Jon managed to get out before an exam room door burst open and a very short, very purple woman came rushing out.

"Wait!" the woman yelled, her brown curls and purple scarf flying behind her as she ran towards Jon, eyes on the dog carrier in his arms.

Jon barely had time to register what was happening before his mom burst out, "Lilah!?"

Amidst the confusion of the Favreaus' goldendoodle Leo getting mixed up with the strange woman's dog - nerdily named Pundit, it turned out - Jon managed to conclude a few things: 1. This was the very same 'Lilah' that Jon’s mom Alex had been waxing poetic about ever since she got back from that first PTA meeting. Apparently Lilah Lovett had argued very eloquently and convincingly for instating some kind of anti-bullying program at the school. 2. Leo and Pundit really did look a lot alike. Apparently they were half-siblings. 3. Lilah's son, a scrawny kid about Jon's own age who apparently also was named Jonathan (“but call me ‘Lovett’), and who came sauntering out into the lobby at a slower pace than his mother, was the very same guy as the one whose ass Jon had been ogling in the line to the school cafeteria earlier that day. Now that Jon was getting as good a look at him from the front as he'd gotten from behind before, he could see that Lovett was wearing a dorky maths t-shirt. And was _ really _hot. Damn.

With the right dog back with the right family, things calmed down enough for the Favreaus, the Lovetts and the veterinary staff to make some deeply awkward conversation. At first, Jon was too busy avoiding looking the other kid in the eye - what if he could somehow telepathically tell that Jon had fantasized about his behind, and was currently half-way to fantasizing about his front as well? - to notice that anything was weird with his mom. But then… why was mom Al blushing so much? And why was _ she _avoiding the other Lovett’s eye? At least the dogs - who were half-siblings, it turned out - was having a friendly, barky chat completely removed of all the human awkwardness.

*

Later that night, Jon retold the story of the dog mix-up over the phone to his best friend Tommy. (They spoke over the phone because Tommy still lived in Washington D.C.; his dad was a clerk at the Supreme Court and his mom worked as a spokeswoman for president Clinton’s new Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright.) As was often the case, Tommy focused on exactly the wrong thing.

“Okay, so you’ve gone on and on about the dogs - I still can’t believe you haven’t emailed me a picture of Leo yet, by the way - and you’ve told me about your mom and Ms. Lovett and the embarrassed veterinary technician,” he said tinnily over the land-line. “But there’s one person you’ve barely even mentioned. What about Lilah Lovett’s son, the other Jonathan? Like, how old did you say he was?”

“I didn’t,” Jon admitted, a little reluctantly. “He’s our age, I guess. Uh, he’s at my school, actually, but not in any of my classes, so I figured, he’s, um, probably a year younger than me?”

“He’s at your school? So you’ve met him before, then?”

“Not really met, no, I wouldn’t say,” Jon protested. “I’ve just… seen him around, you know?”

“Mhm,” Tommy hummed. There was something to his tone that Jon didn’t quite like. It sounded a bit like he was laughing at him. “So there’s literally nothing interesting for you to mention about this kid.”

“Exactly,” Jon agreed, pretending not to hear Tommy’s sarcasm. “Anyway, you’re missing the point. I have this idea…”

*

A few days later - long enough for Jon to have perfected what Tommy had called a “harebrained scheme” but Jon himself thought was a perfectly cromulent plan - Jon ran into Lovett-the-younger again. Which was good, because Lovett was a necessary part of the plan.

Just like the first time that their paths crossed, they were in the school cafeteria. This time, however, Lovett was not in front of Jon in line, but already seated at a table, reading some kind of… advanced math book? Anyway, he was alone, which was perfect. Except, wait... From what Jon remembered of mom Alex’ ramblings about the Amazing Lilah Lovett, she was championing some kind of anti-bullying program. Was Lovett sitting alone because he was shunned by his peers? Or was he studying for a math test? Or just taking a moment for himself? Maybe he would react poorly to Jon intruding upon his solitude to sell him on some harebrained scheme? Jon knew that if he was going to recruit Lovett as an accomplice, he would have to go about it with grace and finesse.

Right as Jon was about to chicken out and go sit with the other piano kids, Lovett looked up from his book. His eyes met Jon’s, where Jon stood hovering three feet away from Lovett’s table. Recognition played over Lovett’s face, then it shuttered into wary suspicion.

“Hi?” Lovett said.

“Hi,” Jon returned, internally kicking himself. He couldn’t think of anything else to say, so he just kept lingering awkwardly.

“So… can I help you?” Lovett asked after a few more moments of silence.

“Uh…” Jon said. Then he finally gathered his courage, sat down across the table from Lovett, took a deep breath, and blurted, “Is your mom gay?”

_ What the hell was that!? _Jon screamed at himself in his head. He bit into his apple in an attempt to hide his face that proved utterly futile; Lovett still managed to glare daggers at him, his eyes narrowing further. He even put his book down completely so he could cross his arms over his chest.

Jon wanted to just leave his tray of mostly uneaten food and go hide in some bathroom for the rest of the day, but instead he forced himself to say, “Because my mom is. Gay, I mean. And I think she has a crush on your mom.”

“Ooookay…?” Lovett said at last. He looked intrigued in spite of himself now, leaning forward towards Jon, but with his arms still crossed.

Jon took another deep breath. “So I think, if your mom is gay - or bi, obviously! - maybe you could, um, help me set them up?”

Fuck, it sounded dumb when he put it like that, in the middle of a crowded high school cafeteria. Lovett’s eyes went from thin slits to big and round in surprise… and then they glanced towards the cafeteria clock.

“I have to go,” he said, picking his math book up and waving it around by way of explanation. “But meet me behind the gym after sixth period.”

*

Lovett arrived to their clandestine meeting behind the gym late, and with a whole harangue of words spilling out of his mouth.

“So I’ve been thinking,” he began, before he even was fully within Jon’s earshot, “and I’ve decided that, yeah, actually, I guess it _ is _ time for Lilah to start dating again after the fiasco with Carlos, and I _ am _ pretty sure that she’s bisexual, and maybe an older, more serious-seeming gay lady _ would _ be the right match for her.” Lovett stopped talking for the briefest of breaths, and then went on, “Anyway, the point is, before I agree to let your mom woo my mom, I need to know her credentials. Who _ is _Alexandra ‘Call Me Al’ Favreau?”

Jon just stared at him, so Lovett added, with a little less steam, “Like… what’s her job?”

“She’s a speechwriter,” Jon replied, still recovering from Lovett’s monologue. “She, uh… she used to work for the president.” As always, he couldn’t help preening a little at that. 

“Bush or Clinton?” Lovett asked, warily. Jon suddenly remembered that this was the son of someone who’d named their dog ‘Pundit’. The Lovetts probably cared about politics.

“Clinton, obviously Clinton!” Jon exclaimed, hoping that that would be the right answer. He was pretty sure that it would be, but what if? He’d have to give the whole plan up. He couldn’t set his mom up with a _ Republican _. Ew.

Thankfully, Lovett visibly relaxed. “Okay, cool,” he said.

“My other mom, mom Liza, still works for the administration,” Jon added, unable to stop himself from showing off. Or showing his family off, really. Because even though he was still a little angry at mom Liza for staying on to work for the President after everything that had happened, it was still pretty cool that she _ worked for the President _.

“Oh,” Lovett said. “So your mom is like… gay-gay, then?” He paused and winced at himself. “Wow, did I just say that? That was really dumb. I mean, you have two moms? Like, they got you together? No dad? Oh, shit, I’m sorry, that’s none of my business. I mean, uh, speechwriter for the president, that’s pretty cool. How come she quit? Did you say she still writes speeches?”

Jon tried to take all of that in, failed, shook himself and set about to try to answer the last questions without sounding too bitter. “Yeah, she still writes speeches, but on a freelance basis, now. It works fine, as you can imagine there are lots of people eager to have their speeches written by someone who wrote for the president. She quit because… well, honestly, because she’s, you know, gay-gay. You’ve seen her, short hair, no make up… and when she was still with mom Liza, they used to wear wedding bands and call each other “wife”, and they raised me together… After we lost the midterms, it was made clear to both of them that it would be in the administration's interest for them to ‘tone it down’ a little, and… well, mom Liza did, and mom Alex refused, and… yeah, now they’re broken up and Al and I live on the opposite side of the country…”

Jon fell quiet and turned away. He didn’t like to think about this, but now the memories came welling up from the huge fight his moms had had when Liza took her ring off her finger to wear it on a chain around her neck, so she could hide it beneath her clothes. It had officially ended with mom Al taking _ her _ring off for good... but the most tragic part was that, as far as Jon knew - and he knew both his moms pretty damn well - mom Liza still wore hers on that stupid chain, and still hoped that Alex would run back and live some kind of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell existence in D.C.. As if she didn’t know how much mom Al had hated working on the speeches defending that disgusting fucking policy.

Jon was ripped from his reverie by a tentative hand on his shoulder. When he turned around, Lovett was looking at him with eyes softer than Jon would have ever expected. It made him look very sweet, and somehow brought out the plumpness of his lips. Jon shook himself again.

“Hey,” Lovett said, his voice as soft as his eyes. “That sounds really rough. I’m sorry.” Then, his voice sharpened again, taking on a brisk, jocular quality. “You know what, let me tell you _ my _ whole tragic life story, that’ll even things out! Okay? Okay. So, uh, I don’t really have a dad, either. I mean, biologically I do, obviously… and that must be true of you, too, now that I… Nevermind. Okay. So, Lilah had me really young. When she was in college she worked nights as a bartender, and my dad - his name’s Jeff - owned the bar. He was much older, the creep.” By this point Lovett’s voice had grown serious, even bitter, but he still spoke very quickly. “I’ve met him, like, three times. He pays child support and sends Christmas gifts when he remembers. Which… we’re Jewish! Anyway, I grew up mostly with my grandparents, because as a, you know, ‘struggling actress,’ Lilah moved around a lot and didn’t really… well, she wasn’t in a stable enough situation… Actually, she told me that my grandpa suggested that he and my grandma raise me as _ their _kid, pretending Lilah was my sister… She refused, obviously. Like, what the fuck? Anyway, I always wanted to live with Lilah, because Syosset sucks, I never fit in there, just like her. So when she got the opportunity to move to LA and work in TV, she rescued me, and now here I am.”

Jon stared at Lovett, speechless again. “You didn’t have to tell me all that,” he finally said.

Lovett shrugged, his jaw set as he looked up at Jon. He’d stepped closer to put his hand on Jon’s shoulder, and then he hadn’t moved away. Jon fought back an impulse to lean down towards him and stood up straighter instead. Something in Lovett’s eyes shuttered, just like it had back in the cafeteria. Jon didn’t like it, and he was trying to think of something to say to relax the mood - Lovett had made himself really vulnerable, just then, and Jon wanted to show that he appreciated it - but as was clearly his wont, Lovett started talking again before Jon had time to gather his thoughts.

“Yeah, maybe it would have made more sense to have _ you _ ask _ me _ something invasive too, you know, to level the field,” Lovett mused. “So yeah, come on, here’s your shot! Ask me whatever you want!” There was a challenge in his eyes now.

Immediately, inappropriate questions started running through Jon’s head. He managed to keep his mouth shut against ‘So do you call your mom by her first name because she’s still kinda like your sister even though she refused to pretend to be your sister?’ and ‘Is it because you were bullied in Syosset that your mom is fighting for an anti-bullying program now?’, but then he remembered something from Lovett’s opening salvo that had been bugging him, and the question slunk out between his lips before he had time to stop it. “Uh, what does it mean that you’re ‘pretty sure’ that your mom is bi?”

Lovett, clearly taken aback, laughed. He leaned back against the gym wall and said “Good question! Well, she’s never actually dated a woman for as long as _ I _ have lived, at least as far as I know, but she told me that before the whole Jeff thing, she had a pretty serious college girlfriend. She told me after Ellen DeGeneres came out. I think, uh…” Lovett paused and glanced at Jon out of the corner of his eye. “I think she suspected that, uh, that _ I _might be gay, and wanted to show that it was okay or something..."

Jon's heart started beating faster. “Are you?” he blurted breathlessly. “Gay?”

“Hey, I said _ one _ intrusive question!” Lovett countered, but he was smiling now, and there was something in his eyes... a twinkle that Jon couldn’t quite put his finger on. “Anyway, you said you were gonna tell me about some kind of parent matchmaking plan?”

*

“Oh, look, a dog park we haven’t been to yet!” Jon said, grabbing his mom to steer her towards his destination. Leo, on his leash, trotted after them. Jon hoped the set up wasn’t _ too _obvious.

“What’s wrong with the dog park we usually go to?” mom Al grumbled, but she let herself be steered along.

“Hey, maybe it’s time to try something new?” Jon retorted as he looked around for the Lovetts as discreetly as he could. Lovett had said they’d be there already when Jon and his mom showed up, but Lovett had been late to their rendez-vous behind the gym, and Jon had a hunch that Lovett was a bit of a time optimist.

But hey, there they were! Lilah was wearing a different flowy purple tunic-thing, and Lovett had a printless black t-shirt on. It made him look older than he did in his usual dorkier tees. Jon focused on Pundit instead, and waited for his mother to spot the Lovetts as well. And sure enough:

“Isn’t that…?” she said with a blush, and any doubts that Jon might have had about the plan immediately fell away.

Soon Leo perked up too, and he started pulling mom Alex with him towards her future girlfriend/partner/wife/whatever. Jon followed in their wake, suddenly self-conscious, but any awkwardness that might have resulted from the manufactured run-in abated in the face of the dogs’ exuberance. Leo and Pundit ran circles around each other, chasing balls and barking. The four humans looked on, amused at their antics. Lovett asked Jon’s mom a million questions about speechwriting, and then Lilah made an impression of the school principal that made the other three roar with laughter. It even made the dogs come check on them that everything was fine.

When Lilah captured Pundit and announced that it was time for them to leave, Lovett elbowed Jon in the side.

“Hey, I have an idea!” Jon exclaimed, trying to not sound too rehearsed. “Why don’t we do this again? That way, the dogs will get used to each other and there’ll be less pandemonium if we run into each other at the vet again.”

“Yeah, Lilah, you always say Pundit needs to be better socialized,” Lovett agreed with a smirk. “She’s wrong, you’re an angel,” he added as an aside to the dog, who was currently chewing on Leo’s ear. (Leo endured his half-sister’s antics with characteristic forbearance.)

Mom Al pulled a considering face. “Yeah, sure, why not?” she asked. Jon could tell that she was more eager about the idea than she wanted to show. “I work from home, so whenever works for you probably works for me…”

Lilah beamed at her. Jon and Lovett shared a triumphant glance.

*

The dog park play dates did become a regular thing, just as planned. Mom Alex always came back with some new amusing anecdote or righteous rant from Lilah to report, and Jon even dared to start teasing her about it a little. She always blushed and told him he was being silly, and then she smiled to herself as she went about putting away groceries or emptying the dishwasher.

Jon and Lovett came along to the dog park every now and then to check on the progress of their plan, but they agreed that it’d be a good idea to stay away most of the time. Unfortunately, that meant that even though they said ‘Hi!’ whenever their paths crossed in school, and with the exception of that one memorable occasion Lovett when helped Jon study for a math exam after Jon complained about it during one of their matchmaking check-in lunches, they didn’t really hang out. Which sucked, because Jon had started to really, really enjoy Lovett’s company. He was just as hilarious as his mother, and there was a sharpness to him that made Jon want to be better, try harder. So maybe Alex wasn’t the only Favreau with a crush.

Tommy, of course, mocked him relentlessly about it. He began every one of their cross-country phone calls with a question about how the harebrained scheme was going, and then how things were with Jon’s ‘partner in crime.’ Jon was pretty sure his blush and grin at those questions matched his mom’s perfectly, and even as he muttered “I should never have come out to you,” he was immensely thankful that he had someone to talk to about all this. Normally, he would have talked to his mom, but he couldn’t risk interfering with the Plan.

Jon even told Tommy about the ridiculous dream he’d had about Lovett one night. In the dream, Jon had been running a school fair kissing booth to try to finance the music program, and he’d shared boring kiss after boring kiss with his female school mates. Then Lovett had left the line to step into position, and the whole world had burst into color. Jon hadn’t even notice that the dream had been in black and white until then.

“And then I woke up before I even got to actually kiss him!” Jon complained into the phone.

Tommy was already snorting with laughter on the other end, but when he spoke, his voice was serious. “Maybe it’s time to set another plan in motion, eh? Why don’t you talk your mom into inviting the Lovetts over for dinner or something? Two birds, one stone, right?”

*

As Pundit and Leo rushed off together into the living room, Lilah and mom Alex gazed into each others eyes in the hallway. Lovett cleared his throat, but neither of the women seemed to notice.

“I’ll, uh, show Lovett my room,” Jon said, stifling a giggle.

Lovett rolled his eyes at him from behind his mom’s back, but when Lilah waved him off with a “Yeah, yeah, sounds great,” he followed Jon up the stairs.

“So that seems to be working out,” Lovett observed as Jon opened the door to his room.

Jon was too nervous to answer as he glanced around the room with new eyes, from his practice keyboard to all the trophies he’d gotten for his piano playing, to the school books on classical composers… ugh, how boringly one-track.

Lovett didn’t seem to think so, though. He went over to Jon’s instrument and drew a finger across the keys. “This is cool,” he said.

“We have a real piano downstairs,” Jon clarified. “A Steinway baby grand - it’s, uh, a really fancy one.” Jon internally kicked himself for being such a blowhard, but he was unable to stop. “Mom payed a shitload to get it here from the East Coast. Don’t ask me why, she hardly ever lets me play on it. But, uh, let’s talk about something else. Sorry about being such a geek.”

“I’m in the Mathletes,” Lovett pointed out. He picked up the framed photo of Jon and Tommy in the White House Rose Garden from Jon’s desk. “Who’s this?” he asked with what maybe - hopefully - was jealousy in his voice.

“Oh, that’s Tommy,” Jon said, faux casual. “He still lives in D.C.. If he ever gets around to actually visiting here, you should come over. You’d like him.”

“He looks like a WASP,” Lovett muttered. And yup, that was _ definitely _jealousy. Jon’s heart soared.

“Well, sure, but he’s never had any trouble getting girlfriends,” Jon said with a pointed look at Lovett.

Lovett jolted and looked away, eyes darting around at everything but Jon as Jon went to sit down at the edge of his bed.

“How do you think it’s going?” Jon asked Lovett’s back, as Lovett - ostensibly? - checked out his piano prizes.

“What?”

“The plan,” Jon clarified, heart hammering in his chest, gearing up to deliver the line that Tommy had laughed at for being cheesy but still insisted that he use. “You know, getting a Favreau and a Lovett to realize that they like-like each other and should be making out.”

Lovett slowly turned around. “Gross,” he said. “Thank you for making me imagine my mom ‘making out’ with someone.” His voice was humorous as ever, but there was an intensity in his eyes that Jon hadn’t seen before. He wasn’t looking away now, as he advanced from Jon’s bookshelf towards his bed.

And then Lovett was in Jon’s lap, small and lithe under Jon’s fingers, ready to be played like a concert grand. His lips were as plump as Jon had imagined against his, and - of course - he was a biter. They kissed for a long time, long enough to drown out the image of their moms doing the same thing, long enough to have Jon’s whole being focused in on only Lovett as Lovett pushed him back against the bedding and leaned down over him, pressed their bodies together.

Finally, Lovett pulled away. “Well, that’s one Lovett/Favreau-couple down, one to go,” he smirked. “By the way, your bed is way too soft. What are you, an egg? If you were to roll -”

Jon cut him off with a pillow to the head, quickly followed by another kiss. And he could _ feel _ in his _ lips _how Lovett was fighting with himself about whether to break the kiss to keep ranting. It was delightful.

**Author's Note:**

> A thousand thanks to my beta, [SelfRescuingPrincess](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SelfRescuingPrincess/) who jumped in late and cleaned this up. You're the best, as always!


End file.
